“Come here,” he called to David, “and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field!”
Parallel translations
- WEB The Philistine said to David, “Come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds of the sky, and to the animals of the field.”
- KJV And the Philistine said to David, Come to me, and I will give thy flesh unto the fowls of the air, and to the beasts of the field.
- NKJV And the Philistine said to David, “Come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field!”
- NASB The Philistine also said to David, “Come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds of the sky and the wild animals.”
- NLT “Come over here, and I’ll give your flesh to the birds and wild animals!” Goliath yelled.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Goliath threatens to feed David's flesh to the birds and beasts. His boastful menace expresses the pride that precedes his fall.
Overview
The giant's grisly taunt declares his certainty of victory and his contempt for David. His arrogant boasting will be ironically reversed when his own body and the Philistine dead become carrion. The scene shows that human pride against God's purposes is doomed, however fearsome it appears.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Ezek 28:9–10Will you still say, ‘I am a god,’ in the presence of those who slay you? You will be only a man, not a god, in the hands of those who wound you.
- 1 Kgs 20:10–11Then Ben-hadad sent another message to Ahab: “May the gods deal with me, and ever so severely, if enough dust remains of Samaria for each of my men to have a handful.”
- Prov 18:12Before his downfall a man’s heart is proud, but humility comes before honor.
- 1 Sam 17:46This day the LORD will deliver you into my hand. This day I will strike you down, cut off your head, and give the carcasses of the Philistines to the birds of the air and the creatures of the earth. Then the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel.
- Jer 9:23This is what the LORD says: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, nor the strong man in his strength, nor the wealthy man in his riches.
- Ezek 28:2“Son of man, tell the ruler of Tyre that this is what the Lord GOD says: Your heart is proud, and you have said, ‘I am a god; I sit in the seat of gods in the heart of the sea.’ Yet you are a man and not a god, though you have regarded your heart as that of a god.
- Eccl 9:11–12I saw something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong; neither is the bread to the wise, nor the wealth to the intelligent, nor the favor to the skillful. For time and chance happen to all.
- Ezek 39:17–20And as for you, son of man, this is what the Lord GOD says: Call out to every kind of bird and to every beast of the field: ‘Assemble and come together from all around to the sacrificial feast that I am preparing for you, a great feast on the mountains of Israel. There you will eat flesh and drink blood.
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Christ at the center
The rise of the anointed king after Israel's failed first choice points to the true Anointed One (Messiah means 'anointed'), the shepherd-king after God's own heart from Bethlehem.
How 1 Samuel 17:44 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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